


Ora e Sempre

by ladyeternal



Series: Nothing Ends 'verse [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Dean and Sam are soulmates, Deus Ex Machina, Episode: s05e04 The End, Fix-It, M/M, References to dub-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-01
Updated: 2014-06-06
Packaged: 2018-02-03 14:33:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1748027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyeternal/pseuds/ladyeternal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.”  – Orson Welles</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Ora e Sempre - Part One

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tiptoe39](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiptoe39/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers: Unlikely past Season 5, but all aired episodes to be safe
> 
> Warnings: Graphic violence, references to dub-con, temporary character death, angst out the kazoo, unapologetic Deus ex machina
> 
> Disclaimer: If I owned Supernatural, there would be unabashed pr0n. I own little more than a tabby that gets destructive when he feels ignored and am only playing with these worlds for my own amusement and the free entertainment of others.
> 
> Prompt: “2014!Dean and 2014!Cas meet up with Gabriel, who in this timeline never revealed himself as an angel. The ‘Trickster’ says he has valuable intel on how to beat the devil, but can he be trusted?”
> 
> Notes: I never thought I’d ever write a fic actually set in The End!verse; that timeline is usually too dystopian for my tastes. And then this prompt came along and smacked me in the head. Please heed the archive warnings and tags!

~ooooOOOoooo~

 

_April 30, 2013_

He didn’t have long. Only the most minute of windows to get in, get to him and get this done.

It was insane. Absolutely 100% nucking futs. But there was only so much he or the world could take, and he was tired of being in pain.

He’d tried to stay out of it. To just ride out the death and destruction and chaos until he had a clear window to leave. He’d never expected to be so easily discovered. Never anticipated that the mark he’d left in Sam Winchester’s mind would be so easily recognizable through the hazy, indistinct filter of human memory. He should’ve just run the minute the aetheric plane felt Sam say ‘yes’. Should’ve hidden at the bottom of the Abyss or in the heart of a black hole.

Of course, it was entirely likely that Lucifer would’ve found him anyway. With Sam’s memories to guide the hunt, Lucifer had easily run him to ground and fettered his grace with barely an apologetic glance.

And so, bound to his brother’s every whim, Gabriel had had a front-row seat to the vengeance Lucifer took on all humankind for their ultimate ancestor’s role in his expulsion from Heaven.

It had taken nearly six months to learn how to slip his restraints. Another ten to make the connections necessary to find out what was happening outside of Lucifer’s stronghold. He’d had to work quietly, especially after Lucifer had burned Crowley out of existence. The slick demon’s luck had finally run out, but not before he’d gotten his unlikely ally a highly useful piece of information.

Now, nearly three years to the day after Sam Winchester had consented to become Lucifer’s vessel, Gabriel was carrying that information to the one person that might be able to use it.

He just hoped the mutton-headed hunter would give him a chance to deliver it.

* * *

Camp Chitaqua was a perfect paramilitary stronghold: out of the way enough that the inhabitants could control the access points and detect intruders almost immediately, but close enough to what had once been towns and cities that supplies could be located with relative ease. For the moment, at least. The longer Lucifer’s reign lasted unchallenged, the scarcer those abandoned essentials were going to become without having to venture into densely populated areas where Croatoan-infected zombies were more easily able to hide.

Still, the rigorous defenses of a hunter-run encampment weren’t much of a challenge for an immortal who could bend the laws of time and space to his will. Firmly wrapped in his Trickster persona, tamping down all but a trickle of his true grace, Gabriel snapped himself into the confines of the compound, aiming for a patch of dense scrub that could conceal him until he could ascertain the layout and find the one person that could verify his true identity.

Careful as the Trickster was, however, he’d forgotten how easy it could be to underestimate a Winchester. Or Castiel.

Mid-flight, he was caught, an impression of toumalinated and starseed and sugar blade quartz all acting as one searing across his senses, snaring him and forcing him onto a different flight path. With a low cry, he fell back into phase with the humans around him, practically at the feet of a cluster that didn’t look all that receptive to the idea of talking before engaging in violence.

Immortal reflexes being what they were, he was still faster than his would-be attackers. Gabriel was on his feet and several paces away with a thought, forgoing his typical snap for flair, watching the humans’ expressions darken at the obvious use of supernatural power.

“Now, now,” Gabriel cautioned. “Let’s think about the idea of ganging up on someone who can move faster than you can see, shall we?”

A dull impact at the back of his neck. Every nerve in his body lit up as lightning erupted from the spot, sending his physical body into seizure. It wasn’t enough to kill him, though it would have felled a human receiving the same shock, but it was enough to send him crashing to the ground, muscles twitching spasmodically as they lingered temporarily beyond his control.

The familiar face of the person that had Tasered him loomed into his vision, clouded in shadow even in the overcast light of day. Viridian eyes were hard as agates, and murderous recognition etched deep lines across a face that could never be described as aught but beautiful.

“Take him inside,” Dean instructed. “And make sure you chain him up.”

“You know who he is?” A young woman asked it, petite and dark-haired, her beauty crossed with the fatigue that came from the impending annihilation of her race.

“We met,” Dean replied as the Trickster was hoisted off the ground. “Years ago.”

“Not a friend, I take it,” Risa commented.

“Not even close,” Dean affirmed, never taking his eyes from the demigod being carried away by his men.

“Why not just kill him, then?”

Dean’s flat tone lingered in the Trickster’s ears, making his answer all the more ominous. “Because I wanna know why Lucifer hasn’t yet, and getting that little bastard to talk is gonna take some… convincing.”

* * *

By the time the Trickster’s body had begun to listen to him again, Dean’s minions had pulled off his shirt and jacket, searched him and clapped him in irons, literally: the manacles that held him and the metal frame they held him to, its elaborate bars forming a six-pointed star, were pure iron, and he could feel the numbing effect lacing through him like venom.

A careful twist of his wrists gave a clear view of what had to be special enhancements devised by Castiel, as well: Enochian binding sigils, powerful enough to inhibit anything short of deities. The symbols had obviously been imprinted deeply into the iron: cast rather than etched. No amount of strength would press them out of shape; the iron would shatter first.

“Getting the idea yet?”

The Trickster’s head shot up to see Dean standing in the doorway. His arms were crossed and his expression was neutral, giving the hunter a deceptively non-threatening demeanor. It didn’t fool the Trickster for a second. “That you’ve been itching to put me in bondage for a while? It’s hardly a newsflash, Deano. I’ve known since Springfield.”

A chilling smile twisted across that generous mouth as the 34-year-old dropped his arms and began to close the distance between them. “Yeah? Maybe it’s about time we indulged a few of those fantasies, then.”

The Trickster’s default humor faltered for a moment, just a moment, as he felt the air in the room change. “You don’t have time to play, Dean. We’ve got a big problem, and you need to know what I know.”

One hand reached out; Dean didn’t even need to look to pull the sheet away from the nearby table, revealing a wide variety of implements that could serve only one real purpose when composed in a collection like this. “Then I’d better get started. Sooner I do, sooner I’ll know you’re telling the truth.”

“You don’t need to do that,” the Trickster hedged. “Dean, you and I both know I’ve never actually lied to you boys. I came to you, right?”

Dean’s face was suddenly so close that the moisture from the human’s breath was damp against the Trickster’s lips, his blue-green eyes filling the Trickster’s vision and their noses nearly touching at the tips. “Probably straight from Lucifer’s base camp. And don’t bother trying to tell me I’m wrong; I can still smell him all over you.”

The Trickster’s mouth went dry. There was something feral in Dean’s eyes… something he hadn’t anticipated needing to deal with. “Dean…”

Something glimmered, and then Dean stood up, stepping back and turning towards his table full of toys. “I don’t care why. I don’t even care why you’re betraying him now. But there’s only one way to trust anything that comes out of your mouth.”

“We don’t have time for this, Dean,” the Trickster snapped, impatient now. “If I’m gone too long, Lucifer is gonna use your brother’s giant feet to kick this place apart like an anthill.”

Dean wasn’t listening. Instead, he hefted a blade, testing the feel in his palm before turning. There was a dead glint in his hollow eyes, a swirl of Darkness that the Trickster doubted the hunter even knew was there. “Let him come. Him an’ me got some unfinished business. Meantime?”

He closed. The Trickster swallowed hard, wishing Castiel wasn’t so damnably clever. “I owe you a couple hundred deaths, Trickster. Time to settle up.”

It was nothing. Human ingenuity when it came to torture couldn’t touch him. The chains held him, but his invulnerability to pain and healing powers were probably still intact. He would get through-

All thought shattered as the knife scored across his chest, too shallow to do much damage. Dean was just cutting… pain was searing through him like acid and Dean was only cutting…

“Ever get me with this one, Trickster?” Dean taunted, voice dark from too much death.

Before he could frame a reply thought the building haze, Dean took hold of the flesh he’d just cut with pincers, slid the knife under the flap of the horizontal cut and slowly sheared the blade down.

* * *

Castiel’s awareness flickered.

He wasn’t used to the sensation registering anymore. The occasional flash across his senses from a human with preternatural abilities used to be enough to get his attention, but even that had faded as the Croatoan virus had infected more and more people throughout the world, driving up the background static of demonic energies within the human population and forcing more and more humans with any skills at all to manifest them due to their terror and biological imperative to survive by any means necessary.

This wasn’t human. Not by a long way. And it wasn’t demonic, either. It felt almost… familiar. Almost like the home he’d spent years trying to drown the memory of in whatever vices he could lay hands on.

Still, this was important. He could dull the feeling once he understood it, but that meant finding it, first. And so he wandered, following the thread like the camp was a Minoan labyrinth and the sensation his only escape, curious in his somewhat vague state.

It was all so much easier to handle with his human faculties altered by chemicals and endorphins. He no longer felt blinded by his fall from immortality, and yet was pleasantly, persistently numbed from the appalling reality of his current condition. Humans were still beautiful; he could not spurn his existence as one without deriding that which his Father had created. But he did not feel beautiful, or powerful. He felt…

Lost. And so he took a leaf from his human kin’s books and did his best to lose himself in whatever dissipation he could obtain.

But even in this state, that flicker refused to die. And there was a sound, now: he could hear it in the distance, growing louder as he neared the one building he’d rarely approached since the establishment of their base of operations here. There were undercurrents in that sound that reverberated through him… echoes of something he’d done his best to forget. Something he’d not heard since before Lucifer’s rising.

Castiel let the effects of the drugs in his system fade into a numbing buzz as he walked into the heart of darkness, unsure of what he would find beyond the knowledge that Dean was torturing again.

Dean. His greatest failure. It had been his responsibility to save Dean from becoming a demon in Hell. His charge to help Dean reach his destiny. He’d rebelled to help Dean stop the Apocalypse, his first steps towards the ultimate loss of his powers. All for naught. All folly.

His ambling, rolling gait belied any serious design in entering the cabin that served as Dean’s “playroom”. Not that anyone in all of Camp Chitaqua would have interfered with Castiel. Human or not, generally stoned to insensibility or not, the former seraph was casually ruthless when challenged; a few bouts in the early days that had left all comers but Castiel sore-headed had effectively dissuaded the members of their ragtag cadre from ever getting in his way.

And then there had been Dean’s reaction after the last fight. Castiel hadn’t even noticed the broken hand he’d sustained before Dean came striding up, looking like a thunderhead about to break.

No matter what he took, Castiel couldn’t rid himself of the memory of the broken heap his assailant had been left in.

The word was quickly passed to any newcomers, the message brutally reinforced: do not interfere with Castiel. The only one allowed to fuck over the former angel was Dean, and trespassing would be punished. Severely. So no one would ever have thought to even call out a word of caution or objection as Castiel opened the iron-reinforced door of Dean’s “playroom” and stepped inside.

A cloying coppery tang assaulted his nose and mouth. He ignored it, closing the door behind him; the scent of blood thick in the air was nothing new to him after the last several years on Earth. He could hear the belabored breathing patterns of Dean’s victim echoing in his ears, evidence of the intense pain that had been inflicted. He could hear Dean’s quiet, even breath below the captive’s, the faintly tense cadence of it the only remaining sign that Dean’s core nature cried out against what he did in this place.

Castiel turned, nonchalance and indifference in every line of his body.

He saw a man stripped to the waist, shackled to a rack similar to the one he and Uriel had designed to hold Alastair, once upon a time. Golden hair, or it would have been, if not discolored by blood-spatter and sweat. There were whole swaths of skin missing, blood leaking in rivulets down the length of the lithe body that sagged against its restraints, the denim hugging the man’s slim hips stained with ever-expanding patches of it. Dean had just finished tearing away a long, thick ribbon of flesh, dropping it with an obscene squish into a refuse bucket beside him. There was something else splattered on the floor between Dean’s feet and his victim’s, and Castiel realized that part of the stench in the room was the mixture of stomach acid and partially-digested food.

Castiel didn’t know the haggard face that was wide-eyed and sweat-drenched beneath the disheveled sunset locks of hair that fell across it. He didn’t need to. There was no mistaking the creature living beneath the skin that Dean had been so assiduously peeling away.

“Gabriel.”

Dean’s head snapped up almost as fast as his captive’s, though far less pain accompanied the human’s motion. “Cas, what the Hell are you doing in here?”

“I heard something,” Castiel informed him, challenge under the careless tone. “And I decided to find out what it was.”

“You still fucking well know better than to-”

“Keep talking to him like that,” a voice snarled, “and chains or no, I’ll rip your spleen out through your mouth.”

It surprised two people in the room to realize it was the Trickster’s voice, dark with menace over agony. The other person was too drugged to care.

“That’s Gabriel you happen to be skinning like fresh game, Dean,” Castiel advised calmly, as if the threat had never been uttered, leaning back against the door frame and crossing his arms like he wasn’t standing in an abattoir. “As in: the archangel.”

“Bullshit. Only angel left on this miserable rock is wearing my brother,” Dean shot back. “ ‘Sides, we ran into this guy years ago, before the world went to Hell. He’s a Trickster.”

“All a disguise, Deano,” Gabriel put in, words still belabored by pain. “Ran out on Heaven ‘bout fifteen centuries back. It was either this or a handlebar moustache and funny hats.”

Dean looked between the two other men, searching for signs of deception. It was outlandish; insane to even consider it. The Trickster that had killed him hundreds of times, that had flirted with Sammy when they thought he was a human janitor at a no-name college, couldn’t be an angel. Let alone an archangel, one of the most powerful beings in Creation. Couldn’t possibly be…

But they hadn’t seen the Trickster since that little game in Broward County. Dean hadn’t really given it much thought; after all, until this moment, the Trickster had been just another monster to gank, if they ever ran across him again, and they’d had much more pressing matters to attend when he’d been brought back from Hell to find Sam addicted to bitch blood and the armies of Heaven and Hell counting down to Armageddon. The continued existence of one pagan demigod wasn’t high on his list of investigative priorities.

And Castiel was so certain… Castiel, who spent all of his time sunk as deep in drugs and drink and dissipation as he could get. Castiel, who might not have powers any longer but had a store of knowledge far more vast than Bobby’s library could ever hope to be and was cleverer even on his most incapacitated day than was rightly good for anyone. Castiel, who had brought Dean out of Hell only to watch in ever-dissociative horror as the world slid inexorably into it.

Castiel, who had also never lied to Dean. Even when it triggered the most malevolent of Dean’s tempers. Even when everyone in their little cadre thought the former angel was out of his celestial mind for it. Even when it made Dean’s fingers itch to choke the words out of Castiel’s throat before he could utter them. Castiel was the one person that Dean could always count on to tell him the truth.

“Gabriel.” Dean turned, reaching for a stoppered vial and turning it over in his hands, not facing either of them. “If it’s true, makes things a Helluva lot more interesting for us, don’t it?”

“Before you start getting even more creative, killer,” Gabriel tossed out, “you might want to consider why I decided to drop in after all this time. ‘Cause it wasn’t the promise of your quaint Midwestern hospitality.”

“That’s assuming I give two shits about anything you’ve got to say,” Dean retorted acidly. “Or that I’d believe a word of it.”

“Even if I can help you save your brother?”

The room went silent. Dean was stock-still, eyes flickering between his table of instruments and his captive. Castiel had every appearance of being unmoved, even bored, but Gabriel knew his fallen sibling was absorbing every nuance of the exchange.

Dean finally turned, eyes cold and hard as mountain jade. “Can’t be done. Lucifer’s in him and he ain’t getting out.”

“Oh, I’m aware,” Gabriel acknowledged. “After all, my big brother’s been using your little brother to fuck me in all sorts of imaginative and not-precisely-consensual ways for the last three years. Doesn’t mean there’s no way to dig him out of Sammy-boy’s skin.”

“You’d say anything to keep yours,” Dean snapped, fury clipping his words and edging his eyes black again. He’d been refusing to think about what Lucifer was doing with Sam’s body ever since he’d learned about what had happened in Detroit, telling himself that Sam had consented to be used; what did it matter what for?

There were days when he even managed to believe it.

Gabriel looked up into Dean’s face, the face of his death, and let drop over a millennium of mischief. “Any other time, you’d be right. But I’m dead no matter what happens, and I could’ve prevented this years ago if I hadn’t had my head up my ass.

“So no tricks. Just a message: you can still save Sam from my brother. And somewhere, beneath all the anger and the guilt and the Dark and the death… somewhere buried in that soft nougaty center that you’ve still got in there no matter how hard you pretend otherwise… you still want to.”

Nothing. Only the sound of three sets of lungs, all exchanging air at different rhythms. Castiel shifted, waiting for an answer he couldn’t predict, not allowing himself to hope after going so long without.

“Say it’s true,” Dean started, the words surprising even him. “Say I do want to. What’s the catch?”

“No catch,” Gabriel promised. “You just have to get Michael’s help.”

“That bastard bailed on this whole deal!” Dean half-roared. “I tried-”

“He’s in Luci’s Cage.”

Dean stilled. This time, even Castiel’s haze of indifference was shaken. “What?”

“That’s why it’s taken me so long to climb out of Luci’s bed and come down here. I had to be sure.” Gabriel shifted, light-headed but slowly, so slowly starting to heal. “Damn, Castiel… you really got serious about the inhibiting sigils cast into these things, didn’t you?”

“Never mind that,” Castiel insisted, suddenly more animated than Dean had seen him in years. “What did you mean about Michael?”

“Michael got tossed into the Cage not long before the big Heavenly retreat.” Gabriel tried to focus, the effort of using any of his powers nearly as draining as the blood loss. “We wanna end this? We gotta spring him.”

“How?” Dean asked, his voice numb and distant. He didn’t want to believe this was possible any more than Castiel. He’d gotten too used to hope being a brittle, bitter thing of no more use than the Impala rusting outside the gates. “Lilith’s blood was the Key, and she’s been dead for years.”

A smile, almost worthy of his glory years, ghosted across Gabriel’s face as he gestured with his chained hands. “Let me out of these, and I’ll show you.”

“I don’t trust you,” Dean stated baldly. It was a delaying tactic and they all knew it.

“You don’t need to,” Gabriel replied. “You just have to believe me.”

For the first time in what felt like forever, Dean turned to Castiel, eyes seeking the former angel’s. Castiel tried to ignore the hope that flared bright and painful within him as their gazes met. “Either he’s telling the truth and we have a chance, or he’s lying and we all die now,” he told his hunter, voice no longer deadened from drug-induced euphoria.

Whatever Dean saw in his only remaining friend’s eyes, he never said. Without a word, he turned and struck the archangel’s chains.


	2. Ora e Sempre - Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.” – Orson Welles_

~ooooOOOoooo~

 

“All right.” Dean pulled a chair around and sat backwards, crossing his arms over the back. “What’s your big plan?”

Gabriel had emerged from a cool shower and was rummaging through the pantry in Castiel’s cabin, muttering to himself. Dean refused to think about the shapely posterior that peeked through the door when the angel bent over. Especially since he’d been peeling the hide off that same angel not more than an hour ago. It had taken time for Gabriel to heal once the chains were off, the angel’s skin slowly re-growing to cover muscle and sinew exposed by Dean’s holy-oil-anointed knife.

Angel. Christ, this was so screwed up.

“The plan is to get Michael out of the Cage as soon as possible.” Gabriel stood, having successfully located an ancient can of powdered cocoa, and scampered across the room to start water boiling on the wood-fire stove. “He’s the only one that can make your hide invulnerable enough to face off with Lucifer.”

“Seems kinda counterproductive,” Dean hedged. “You’re talking about saving Sam. Michael gets up in my skin and it’s Celebrity Death Match: Apocalypse.”

“Right now, he’ll agree to pretty much anything if it’ll get him outta the Pit.” Gabriel frowned at the color of the liquid in the pot on the stove, and then finally just blew a tiny curl of grace into it until it turned the shade he wanted. It was a risk, using his grace to ensure it would be proper cocoa. He knew he was being a bit vain. But he needed the stability just now. “Including letting you do the talking.”

“I thought your kind took over the vessel completely,” Dean countered, flummoxed. It bothered him, thinking about Sam fighting Lucifer for control all this time…

“Mostly,” he agreed, locating a tin mug in Castiel’s cupboards and pouring the finished cocoa into it. “After all, nearly everything that would need doing while possessing a vessel is something humans either shouldn’t know about or would be better off not remembering. But that doesn’t mean we can’t let the soul of the vessel be aware or act.”

“So for all we know,” Dean started, his words tasting like ash in his mouth, “Sammy’s been in there for the last three years…”

“Aware of everything Lucifer is doing and unable to stop any of it?” Gabriel sipped at the cocoa as he sat, his gaze on Castiel, who was seated as far from Dean as possible without making it look like he was putting distance between them. “Probably. I’ve seen the occasional flicker that might mean he is, but there’s no way to be sure without digging around inside his skull.” He flickered a half-smirk at Dean. “I’m not _that_ suicidal.”

Dean snorted. “How long until Lucifer comes to collect you?”

“Not long, but hopefully long enough. I’ve left a nice little breadcrumb trail through the middle of nowhere, and after spending this long screwing me into submission, he’ll follow it until he figures out I’m not at the end of it.”

“So what’s the plan, then?” Dean asked, nodding once. “How do we pop Mikey outta the box?”

“The Horsemen’s rings,” Gabriel told him. “They’re the universal keys to the Cage. Put them together with the right words and big brother’s footloose again.”

Castiel’s eyes narrowed. “You believe he will give it to you?” he asked, tone sharper than his drugged expression.

“He’s on a leash right now, Cassi,” Gabriel replied. “He’ll do whatever it takes to snap it, and he’s not looking at an overabundance of options.”

“Somebody wanna read me in?” Dean put in testily. “Who doesn’t have much choice but to give us what?”

Castiel answered without batting an eye. “Gabriel believes that he can persuade Death to give us his ring.”

“ ‘Kay… great.” Dean looked expectantly at Gabriel. “How we gonna get the other three? Take out an ad in the newspaper?”

“Dean, Dean, Dean.” Gabriel chuckled. “You think we always give our prophets enough prophecy to secure a book advance? They’re mostly in one- or two-liners, scattered everywhere like clues to the biggest scavenger hunt in the universe. I was particularly proud of the placement of this one, though.”

“Which, smartass?”

The smirk on Gabriel’s lips deepened. “ _One ring to rule them all; one ring to find them. One ring to bring them all and in the Darkness, bind them._ ”

Dean’s forehead creased as his eyebrows knitted incredulously. “Fucking Tolkien? Seriously?”

“It was there if you needed it,” Gabriel replied with a grin. “If I wasn’t around, Cassi here woulda run across it eventually.”

“Death is the greatest Horseman,” Castiel told Dean. “Probably because he transcends all of the others. With his ring, we can summon the others’ right off their fingers.”

“And you really think this’ll work?” Dean pressed. “We pop Michael outta the box, he rides around under my skin letting me call the shots while I try having a heart-to-heart with a brother that’s currently being muzzled by the devil?”

Castiel tilted his head to look at Dean. The expression was pharmaceutically placid, but the set of those blue eyes was so reminiscent of the angel he’d once been that Dean started. “When exactly did you abandon your death wish?”

It wasn’t something the old Castiel would have asked. Dean wasn’t sure why that bothered him. Every so often, completely without his consent, Dean found himself missing the nerdy trenchcoat-clad angel who had been so petrified at that nameless brothel. Who had dragged him along on a hopeless search for God, the Colt, anything that could put an end to the Hell that Lucifer was unleashing on Earth while wearing Sam’s skin.

Who had hidden him in the remote mountains to scream out his grief at the broken sky when he’d been forced to put a bullet between Lisa’s eyes. Dark eyes that no longer knew him, only reflected the ravening madness of Croatoan, holding neither grief nor guilt over the death of her son.

Their son, at least in Dean’s heart. A son that Lisa had murdered not long after the demonic disease had taken hold.

Cas had refused to let him leave their hideaway for months after that, refused to yield even when Dean raged and threatened and tried to sneak off behind the angel’s back. Dean needed to be safe, he’d reasoned. Dean was the only one that could put an end to it. He had been an immovable object in those days, before…

Before.

And maybe it was too late. It was already too late for Bobby, for Ellen and Jo, for Rufus and Lisa and Ben and Cassie. For all those infected with Croatoan, for those in isolated pockets trying desperately to survive. Maybe it was even too late for he and Sam and Cas.

But Gabriel was here, believing it wasn’t. A fool’s faith that a world going to Hell could still shit out one last miracle.

“So who do I have to kill to get an apocalyptic equestrian’s attention?”

* * *

The camp was buzzing; Gabriel could sense it, the way the humans murmured in their hearts at the idea of an angel among them. Was he a spy for Lucifer? Were the others returning? Was he just going to destroy the Croats in the area, or was there a way to heal them?

Hope was far more dangerous a contagion than any demonic plague, and it cautiously swept through the denizens of Camp Chitaqua, burning low but persistent, leaving a fever-brightness in war-dimmed eyes that refused to fade.

All except for Castiel’s.

Gabriel could only watch in growing concern as Castiel traded weapons, knowledge, skill: anything and everything that he was in exchange for a rainbow of pills and potions, spirits and sin. The men didn’t dare touch him; Gabriel couldn’t fathom why, with how freely Castiel gave himself away. A bevy of women, from beauty unscathed to those painfully disfigured to those whose lives left them so little self-esteem that Castiel’s attentions made them weep; all seemed to share him equally.

When he disappeared into a bedroom surrounded by several of those women, obviously having dosed himself with whatever aphrodisiac was on hand, Gabriel decided to take a walk. There had been a time, once, when Gabriel would eagerly have joined his younger brother’s ménage a douze.

Not now. Too many things within him had changed during his tenure in Lucifer’s bed.

It wasn’t until he heard the click of a safety that he even realized he’d entered Dean’s cabin. “What the Hell are you doing in here?”

“Cassi needed some privacy,” Gabriel replied, his tone mild. “Who else do I know around here?” Wary, but not finding a hole in the logic, Dean relaxed his gun arm. The archangel, in turn, flopped into a chair. “We don’t have an abundance of time here, Deano. You sure that crew you sent knows how to find what we need?”

“They’ve survived this long,” Dean replied, darkness cloaking any emotion in the words. “If they come back, they’ll have what we need.”

The implication wasn’t lost on Gabriel. Dean had resigned himself to the idea that he was going to lose people on any mission they undertook, whether it actually happened or not. It was a jaded perspective that, while understandable given everything that had happened, betrayed the deep wounds left in Dean’s soul by everything that had transpired in the last few years.

“Anyway,” Dean continued, forcing his voice into a lighter note, “we’ve got until tomorrow night, right? The ritual to call Death has to be done after dark?”

“We’ll do it when we’re ready to do it,” Gabriel negated sharply. “Neither we nor the world have the time or luxury of observing all of the niceties. Death won’t care one way or the other, anyway.”

Dean cast him a sidelong glance. “You’ve met him?”

An emotion Dean couldn’t name crossed the archangel’s face: shadows of memories, events lost to dust and shadow. “Yes. He’s… everything you’d expect, except not.”

“Yeah, that’s nice and vague.” Dean chuckled as he took a swallow of moonshine, fresh from the camp’s still. “No chance on you clearing that up any?”

“You’d have to be Death to understand Death,” Gabriel added with a shrug. “Not even his Reapers know him completely. He’s a primal force, possibly even older than Dad and the other Gods, and that lends a certain inscrutability to him. I doubt I can explain it any better than that, and you’re very likely to not want to know more once you’ve met him.”

Once, Dean might have pushed. Now, he merely returned the Trickster-angel’s shrug and finished off the liquid in the glass. “I’m getting a couple hours. You can sleep on the couch if you want. Just don’t forget that I keep a knife anointed with pepper spray and holy oil under the pillow.”

Gabriel’s eyebrows lifted. “That’s an… interesting mix. Cassi’s idea?”

A vicious smile twisted Dean’s mouth. “Yeah. Most of the arsenal has been Cas’ idea, one time or another. He likes to keep useful when he’s not stoned out of his mind.”

For a moment, Gabriel remained silent. Then, unable to help himself: “What happened between you two?”

Dean looked at him sharply. “What makes you think anything happened?”

“I’ve got eyes, moron.” To prove it, Gabriel rolled them theatrically. “And it’s fairly obvious.”

It took a long moment of holding the Trickster’s eyes before Dean lowered his own. “It’s none of your business,” he muttered darkly. “What’s between me an’ Cas is just that: between me an’ Cas.”

“Whatever.” Another shrug. “Just don’t forget that he’s an angel, Dean. Even if he’s fallen, that doesn’t change what he really is.”

Dean’s eyes narrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

A ghost of a smirk. A twitch of golden brows. “You’re a bright boy, Dean. You’ll figure it out.” The archangel stretched, then slipped from the chair to the couch. “I’m going to get some rest. You should, too. We’re going to have a long day tomorrow.”

For a moment, Dean’s expression warred with itself. There was a part of him that almost, _almost_ wanted to invite the archangel to join him. For sex or comfort or just to keep a closer eye on the Trickster, he wasn’t quite sure, but the impulse was there, strong and nagging at the back of his tongue to be spoken.

In the end, he didn’t. He couldn’t bring himself to, any more than he could bring himself to admit that he wished Castiel didn’t spend his nights ensconced with as many women as he could fit in his bed. Dean didn’t deserve the kind of comfort he wanted. And certainly not from Gabriel. Not from someone that had been warming the bed of the parasite behind his baby brother’s face for three years.

He didn’t hear the sigh that Gabriel released as he turned and went to bed, and, if he did, he refused to think about why he couldn’t tell if it was relieved or disappointed.

* * *

What surprised Dean was that Gabriel seemed to sleep for most of the day. As comfortable on the threadbare couch as on a feather bed, the archangel seemed to be dead to the world when Dean passed through the cabin just after daybreak and then swung by again at midday, when the guards he’d posted on his cabin had advised him that the angel hadn’t made a sound since their arrival.

Dean knew he hadn’t left; he’d lit the ring of holy oil that encircled his cabin before posting the guards. It was mingled with peat moss, which kept it low enough to the ground to allow humans to cross the barrier, but it was still impassable to anyone with a shred of angelic grace.

When Dean came into the cabin to let Gabriel know that the group he’d sent after the ritual items had returned, however, Gabriel blinked awake and rolled over, looking up at Dean with glowing amber eyes that held no trace of drowsiness. “They’re back, aren’t they?”

“Yeah. Last few just got in.” Dean didn’t question how Gabriel knew. He was used to Cas’ extra-sensory perceptions, even in his mortal form. “Where do we want to do this?”

Sitting up slowly, wincing at the kink in his back, Gabriel sighed. “I’m gonna bet yours and Castiel’s cabins are the best protected, right?” When Dean nodded, Gabriel glanced around them. “Not enough room here. We’d better do it at Cassi’s place.” He flickered a grimace up at the hunter. “Assuming he’s not currently _entertaining_.”

The fulminating glare Dean shot him wasn’t nearly enough to intimidate the archangel. But Gabriel appreciated the effort, anyway.


	3. Ora e Sempre – Part Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.” – Orson Welles_

~ooooOOOoooo~

 

It seemed to take hours to get everything ready. Gabriel insisted that they have everything staged: once Death was summoned, Lucifer would know something was up, and there was only so long even Gabriel’s shields would prevent the Devil from figuring things out. Summoning the other Horsemen’s rings would only accelerate the deterioration of their protection. If they weren’t ready to summon Michael from the Cage before Lucifer got there…

Dean really didn’t need to be told what would happen.

Fortunately for them, Castiel’s cabin was chock-full of all manner of ritual ingredients. Dean had only needed to send people out for some of the more esoteric items that had been left behind by people fleeing the Croatoan-infected cities. It took a lot of logistical negotiation and a little corner-cutting to set up three _very_ different rituals in one space, but they were ready to start by the time the sun began to grow heavy in the sky.

Whatever Dean had been expecting from the ritual to summon Death, though, it wasn’t this: no lightning or eldritch fire, no sound or movement, no earthquakes or vortices. Castiel and Gabriel finished the chant, tossing the last of the ingredients into the bowl with the shattered fulgurite; between one blink and the next, a man clad in a long black coat and holding a silver-headed cane stood amongst them.

His bird-like features and dark eyes had an elegant, alien cast to them, and his expression held neither contempt nor indifference. Those fathomless eyes merely regarded them in the same manner as their owner had appeared: as if he had been there with them all along.

It creeped Dean right the fuck out.

“You finally decided it was time,” Death observed to Gabriel.

“Timing is everything,” Gabriel responded, the corner of his mouth twitching up. “You know that better than anyone.”

A low, noncommittal sound hummed in Death’s throat. “Perhaps.” He glanced at Castiel briefly, sharp eyes missing nothing before they swept to Dean. “Hello, Dean.”

The bottom dropped out of Dean’s stomach. Refusing to quail, he still found his voice sticking before a rusty “hello” forced its way past his lips.

Death actually appeared briefly amused. “Are you sure he’s the one? He’s slipped across my boundaries often enough, but…”

“He is the Righteous Man,” Castiel ground out, his voice strangely hot with challenge. “I dragged him from Hell myself.”

Those hollow eyes fixed on the fallen seraph again, and Dean fought down the urge to step between them. “Such a peculiar little thing,” he observed quietly. “You’d follow him right back there.”

Castiel replied nothing, merely held Death’s gaze. A clash of sword and scythe, confined to the locked contest of ebony and cobalt, neither allowing the other a moment’s quarter…

“Hey!” Dean finally grunted, unable to keep still any longer.

Gabriel edged closer to Castiel even as Death turned his head slightly in the hunter’s direction. “Keep that one on a tighter leash, Gabriel. He’s still too young to be let out on his own.”

Defensive of Castiel even after all that had happened, Dean took a step towards Death that might have been menacing if the creature hadn’t been so completely unflappable. “We ain’t got tons of time here. Just give Gabe the ring so we can move this along before Satan shows up.”

“I can’t.”

Dean did a triple blink. “Whaddya mean: you can’t?” he demanded.

“He can’t give it to me, Deano,” Gabriel clarified, eyes leaving Death to meet the hunter’s shocked gaze. “He can only give it to you.”

“Me? Why me?” Dean refused to back up, refused to shove his hands behind his back. He wasn’t coward, damn it, and he wouldn’t act like one.

He just wasn’t an overconfident, indestructible kid anymore, either.

“A human is the only one that can open the Cage, Dean.” Death’s gaze and voice never seemed to waver even for an instant: a steady expression and an unruffled, elegant tone that carried all the more power for their imperturbability. “It was always your brother, and it can only be you.”

“Why?” Dean repeated, more wary than startled now.

“What do you think that Cage is forged from?” Death pressed. “No metal can contain grace; no holy flame can live in Hellfire. What else could possibly Cage an archangel?

“For that matter, what opens it? The blood of the First Woman, after 65 seals all related to the human heart are broken. The Rings of my brothers: War, Pestilence, and Famine. And when they do not ride, where are they but in the human soul, waiting for their moment to rise?” Death almost smiled then, and the light it cast across that thin face turned Dean’s blood cold. “And who, of all creatures great and small, know me so well as humans?”

Slowly, Dean’s mind wrapped around the concept. Not for lack of intelligence, though he wished his brother were here for the first time in years…

At least, the first time that he was willing to admit it.

“The Cage is made from something within us?” Dean offered slowly.

Gabriel nodded. “Every sin that’s ever been washed away, Dean. Every stain on the human heart that’s ever been scrubbed off reinforces that Cage just a little more, and torments whatever or whoever’s inside. The Cage is built to be more than just a prison. It’s living torture; whoever winds up inside is surrounded by four walls of rage and darkness just looking for a target.”

And Lucifer had been there for centuries. With a sick twist in Dean’s gut, he realized that he actually almost felt sorry for the angel currently wearing his brother.

Thinking about Sam immediately cleared away any of that.

While Dean had been wrapping his mind around the concept, Death had shifted his cane in his grip and slowly drawn his ring from the third finger of his right hand. When Dean’s eyes refocused on his environment, the ring was being held out to him, the dark feathers of Death’s brows arching inquiringly.

Before anyone else could say a word, or his nerve could desert him, Dean reached out and took the ring from Death. “So, uh… exactly how do I use this thing to… um…”

“Call the others’?” Death finished. “Just close your eyes, Dean. Close your eyes, and relax your mind. You should feel it almost immediately.”

With a glance at Cas, who was still staring down Death like he had the grace to try and take the creature on, Dean took a breath and followed the Horseman’s instructions. For a moment, there was nothing… just the cold weight of Death’s ring in his palm…

And then he felt them. Echoing, pulsing threads that bound the others to Death’s side… for Death encompassed all their endeavors, but they could not encompass all that Death was in return. They were part of him, and they would come when he called… whosoever bore the Ring held dominion over them…

“Just the rings, Dean,” came Death’s voice, a reminder, subtle yet reproving. “Only the rings are needed. Leave the others be.”

It took time; too long, in Dean’s estimation; but he found the difference that Death wanted him to find. A little groping, clumsy and indistinct, but he could see the rings in his mind’s eye, shown them, he was sure, by the ring that was now cold fire in his hand.

_I need to borrow these,_ he couldn’t help thinking.

Three pinging clatters. Dean’s eyes fluttered open in surprise at the proximity of the sound. Somewhere, in the back of his mind as the connection faded, there were three howling cries of outrage that fell suddenly silent.

“Dean?” Castiel’s voice, gravelly and not quite indifferent. “Dean, you have to open your hand.”

Surprisingly, Dean found his hand opening easily, as if Castiel had commanded his nerves and muscles to act. There was Death’s ring, resting light and cool on his palm, innocuous as one of Dean’s own silver bands. It trembled of its own accord, and the other rings were pulled up from the floor as if all four were magnetized, the three talismans of War, Pestilence and Famine locking into position against Death’s ring as if soldered together.

“Are you all right?” Castiel asked, taking a light step closer to the human he still considered his charge. He never let Death out of his peripheral vision, unafraid to challenge even him. He had nothing left to lose, after all.

“Yeah.” Dean couldn’t bring himself to close his hand again, staring down at the neat geometric arrangement of the talismans of the Horsemen. Just beneath them, where Death’s ring had rested against his skin, there seemed to be the faintest flicker of a mark, as if the ring had limned a silver scar into his palm. Tearing himself away from straining to see if it was real or a trick of the light, Dean pulled his eyes up to Castiel’s, boggled for a moment by the intensity of their blue.

It had always been far too easy to lose himself in Cas’ eyes.

“I’m okay,” he affirmed again, blinking to make the world right itself again. “What else we need to do to make this work?”

“Michael’s cooperation,” Gabriel replied. “And that’s gonna take some fast talking.” He turned to Death briefly. “You’re not leaving, are you?”

An almost smile. “I’m never far away.” And, just as he’d appeared, he was gone between one blink and the next.

The ArchHerald let show the briefest of shudders. “See what I mean about him?” he asked Dean, stretching over and plucking the combined rings from Dean’s hand.

“Yeah; real charmer.” A tremor passed through Dean, shaking him more visibly than archangel’s shudder, echoes lingering like aftershocks in his limbs. He fervently wished that any of the weapons he currently wore would make the prickle in his fingertips go away. Considering what had just been in the room with them, he doubted anything would. “So what’s next?”

Castiel dragged a bowl across the ritual space. “We open the lines of communication.” Without giving Dean a chance to so much as protest, Castiel drew the athame from the sheath on the table and dragged the blade over his left arm, opening a long gash that gushed bright red blood into the bowl waiting beneath.

Dean’s eyes went round as saucers and he darted forward to grip Castiel’s left hand at the wrist. It almost shocked him: how thin it was, how easily the bones ground together under his grip. Castiel, for all that he was human, seemed to ignore it other than a deep wince around the eyes that were gauging not how much blood he was losing, but how much was filling the bowl beneath. “Cas… Cas, that’s enough.”

“No, it’s not.” Castiel hated the sensation of his body trying to sway, his vision swimming and his mind blurring at the edges as the blood continued to pump in warm gouts from the wound in his arm. Refusing to let it show, refusing to allow Dean to see him weak, Castiel infused his faltering muscles with every remaining ounce of his will, every tiny flare of power that he could still feel kindling within him when he least expected it. The last guttering, infinitesimal sparks of a flame nearly extinguished, but it would be enough… it had to be…

Another hand, this one wrapping over the gushing wound. Castiel felt Gabriel’s grace thread through him, weaving his arm whole and filling his veins with oxygen-rich blood, forcing life back into limbs that cried out for it in spite of Castiel’s perfect willingness to sacrifice all for this last, desperate gambit.

“It’s enough, little brother.” The voice of the ArchHerald, redolent with power unheard from in millennia. Castiel turned his face to meet his brother’s calm golden eyes. “You still have work to do, and I have more resources than the others. It’s enough.”

Dean tightened his grip on Castiel’s wrist, catching his elbow to keep him upright. “Let’s get a move on, man. When did we lose the sun, anyway?”

Gabriel was already moving, settling into position and taking a breath he didn’t need. “You were under a long time getting the rings,” he supplied casually. “You didn’t feel it, but you were on a different plane there for a while. You know better than anyone how the time-slips work.”

Momentarily flummoxed, Dean let Castiel shake his grip off, finally realizing that he was wearing a watch and glancing at the time.

Nearly midnight. In no time at all, it would be Sam’s thirtieth birthday.

Dean hated himself a little for remembering that.

At the edge of the circle, Gabriel was clutching the bowl of Castiel’s blood in both hands. Something in his sharp face seemed… almost hesitant. Afraid, even. It was a shock to Dean to remember what Castiel had told him while they’d waited for the teams to come back with the required ritual supplies:

_“Gabriel vanished from the Host not long after giving the Word of God to the prophet Mohammed. In all these centuries, no one has ever been able to find the slightest trace of him, or what might have befallen him.”_

_“So why d’you think he’s here now? What’s his angle?”_

_“I never understood him even when he was in Heaven, Dean. The closest I might be able to come is that he was the most optimistic of the archangels; the peace-maker. I believe you’d call it ‘middle child syndrome’?” A shrug “His reasons are his own. If it puts an end to all this without destroying all human life in the process, what do you care?”_

That was the face of a younger brother unsure of the reception he was about to receive from an adored elder brother. A brother Gabriel had loved so much that he’d refused to take sides in a war that might have gotten said brother killed.

The reminders of Sam were coming faster now: Dean remembered a night where the roles were reversed, but the nervousness was no less real. A night when he’d been uncertain of how Sam would react to his presence after two long years apart.

“Michael?” Gabriel’s voice didn’t waver, but the hesitance was there, too: a reluctance to open a Pandora’s Box that couldn’t be closed, no matter how necessary it might be to release its contents. “C’mon, Michael: pick up the phone, bro. We’re running outta time.”

The blood bubbled and rippled in the bowl. For a moment, Dean wasn’t sure how exactly he was going to know that Gabriel wasn’t just putting them on…

Then: _“Gabriel?”_

A sigh wobbled out of the ArchHerald’s throat, filled with too many emotions to catalogue. “Hey, Michael. Been a while.”

_“You’re still alive.”_ Dean had no idea how he was hearing the voice, since Castiel’s had only been a high-pitched shriek that had nearly shattered his eardrums along with the glass in that abandoned gas station. But he could hear Michael as clearly as if the angel were standing in the room with he and Castiel and Gabriel. _“I had almost given up hope of that. How did you find me?”_

“Bribery, chicanery, extortion… y’know: the usual way.” Gabriel’s voice seemed to pick up a touch, the hesitation lifting. “Found a way to spring you, too-”

_“Then hurry. You won’t have much time before Raphael notices what you’re doing.”_

Gabriel’s face turned grim. “We’ll deal with him later. But we’re not springing you until you agree to my terms.”

Silence. The blood seemed to almost still. Then: _“You disappoint me, brother. You would put a price on stopping Lucifer from destroying our mortal brethren?”_

“I’m trying to put an end to this without you two burning what’s left of this planet down with your giant grudge match!” Gabriel shouted into the bowl, deep anger clipping his words. “You’re so concerned about Edom’s descendants, but you’ve never once stopped to consider what your pet war with Lucifer is doing to them. To all of us. I’m sick of getting run over by you two in your race to annihilate each other. You want out of that box? You’re gonna do what I tell you to for once.”

Another moment passed. Dean felt the pressure in the air on the back of his neck: a steadily-growing, tangible intuition that something would go wrong, that Gabriel had miscalculated, that Lucifer was going to arrive and level the camp before Michael could pull his head out of his celestial ass.

_“And what exactly is it you want of me, Gabriel?”_ The air itself shivered from the cool tone in the archangel’s voice, distant and almost aloof. _“What price for the freedom to stop Lucifer’s dominion?”_

Gabriel wavered, the cutting edge in Michael’s tone affecting him more than he probably wanted to admit. Dean couldn’t stop himself from stepping forward, taking over for him. “You gotta let me do the talking,” he informed the Highest of the Host. “You can ride my ass, but not my mouth.” Castiel threw him a sidelong glance. Dean’s lips slammed shut, the tips of his ears turning red. “That… probably coulda come out better.”

“It’s to the point, though.” Gabriel threw Dean a smile, grateful to him for alleviating the moment. “Dean’s the only one that has a prayer of reaching through Lucifer and getting Sam to take back control. You want out? You gotta agree to keep your mouth shut and keep Dean’s hide from getting permanently dented while he does it.”

_“You never give up, do you, brother?”_ A slightly more rueful tone now, an elder brother’s grudging acceptance of a younger brother’s more annoying idiosyncrasies. _“You really believe this can be settled with words, even after all that has happened. After all this time.”_

For a moment, Gabriel was quiet. “I have to,” he admitted softly. “I have to believe that you two cutting each other to ribbons is the very last thing Dad wanted, no matter what He said back then.”

_“Whether I agree with you or not,”_ Michael replied a touch briskly, _“my options are limited. Very well: I will protect my Vessel, but he can attempt to reach his brother.”_

Gabriel went shock-still suddenly, feeling the descent. He set the bowl of blood down just inside the circle. “He’s here.”

Dean’s eyes went wide, an unreasoning primal reaction taking root. “What?”

“He’s found me.” Spinning to his feet, he pushed the joined rings into Dean’s hands. “Finish it. I’ll hold him off.”

“I can’-”

“You have to!” Gabriel shoved Dean back. “Don’t fuck this up, Dean. Everything depends on you now.” He turned and ran out the door.

Dean looked helplessly at Castiel. Castiel looked back at him, through him. For a heartbeat, neither moved.

And then Castiel stepped in, fisted both hands in Dean’s hair, and kissed him hard.

Dean gasped into it, reaching for Castiel’s hips to drag him in. The former angel yanked Dean’s head back out of the kiss, gazing up at him with dead sober blue eyes. “Kick it in the ass.”

Ellen’s last words to them. Dean’s heart lurched; his mouth started to frame Castiel’s name…

But by the time he did, the fallen angel was already out of his arms, out the door and down the steps at a dead run.

Forcing himself to pull together, Dean straightened. They were all going to die; already he could hear the screams of his people clamoring for weapons or cover. But he’d always known that would happen. If it came down to it, he’d always known that he would sacrifice anything and anyone for Sam.

And now was probably his last chance to make good on it.

Grabbing the bowl, Dean took a deep breath and dropped to his knees in front of the circle on the floor. “Okay, Michael… you ready to do this?”

_“Yes. It’s been a long time coming.”_ A pause. _“Are you?”_

A piercing, shrill cry. Risa. Dean’s eyes closed, a trail of bodies flashing in his mind. Friends, monsters, family, lovers. Dead, or wishing they were. And, at last, Dean had the means to make all of the death and suffering mean something.

He tossed the rings into the center of the circle, the ritual words falling from his lips as easily as spring rain from the sky. He watched unafraid as the portal opened, light and music shimmering up from within, as Lucifer had done in the convent so long ago.

This time, he knew what it was. He felt the pull on his soul, stronger than it had been then, and he welcomed it, accepted it, allowed it to wrap around him in readiness to claim him for its own.

“Yes.”


	4. Ora e Sempre – Part Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.” – Orson Welles_

~ooooOOOoooo~

 

Outside, chaos reigned in the distance. Castiel caught up with Gabriel, whose bright eyes scanned the lifeless bodies littering the ground, the smoldering cabins and trees. Dean’s was engulfed in flames several yards away, and the shrieks of those dying in agony inside tore at Gabriel’s grace. A flicker of will put their tortured lives at peace; it was all he could do for them now.

It also got Lucifer’s immediate attention.

He appeared on the path before them: Sam Winchester’s titanic form silhouetted in flame and moonglow, hollows carved from shadow beneath his cheekbones and eyes glittering sherry gracelight. His massive hands were half-curled, ready for anything that might be brought against him. That walnut silk mane was a windswept halo around his gorgeous face, and the immaculate silver-gray suit he wore was touched here and there with blood splatter.

Gabriel’s breath stilled in his throat, the image before him more arresting than he’d ever anticipated. Heylel… Light-bringer of God. The brother that had first taught him the importance of patience, that had schooled him in the art of guile and shown him how to bend time and space to his will. Then, they had both used those skills to fashion gifts for and play games with their brothers and sisters. The amusements of children, already echoing their Father’s actions.

Now, Gabriel had run out of tricks, and his brother had run out of patience.

Castiel had long since moved beyond the capacity for awe in the face of his angelic brethren. The first sight of Lucifer had Castiel darting to a hidden weapons cache at the side of his cabin, tucked away in what had once been a meat locker long since unable to keep anything chilled. Drawing out an already-loaded repeating crossbow, Castiel swung and fired, sinking a bolt deep into Lucifer’s chest.

Ordinarily, Lucifer would have simply dissolved the arrow with a slight gesture of contempt. This arrow, though, could not be willed away.

Just before the last of his power had drained, Castiel had summoned his full angelic armor and weapons. Working with the blacksmith who had forged all of their other weapons and restraints, Castiel had slowly worked the metal into a cache of arrows that could wound any angel in the Host.

He fired again, even as Lucifer glanced down at the offending arrow. This shot caught Lucifer in the shoulder, shearing through muscle and sinew in a way that would have paralyzed a human’s arm. Lucifer looked up at Castiel, eyes narrow with rage at the impudence of this fallen Power.

A final bolt flew. Before it found its target, Lucifer raised a single hand.

With no grace left, the last embers spilled out with his blood to ensure the success of the ritual to speak with Michael, Castiel could not command the metal that had been designed to bend to his will, and his alone. The Morningstar seized control instantly, flinging the arrow back towards its owner with a surge of grace, the might of the second-Highest in the Host propelling it almost faster than sight directly into Castiel’s heart.

Gabriel saw Castiel recognize his death before it struck, watched the acceptance write itself across those gentle features; the fallen angel opened his arms, dropping the crossbow as he closed his bright cobalt eyes. His body fell backwards in an ungraceful arc, thrown by the wall of force behind the arrow, his dark head slumping against the cabin wall behind him at an unnatural angle.

Lucifer turned to face Gabriel.

Cold certainty settled over the ArchHerald. He would not allow all of this to be in vain. His wings unfurled at his back, flaring up and arching wide, a reminder to Lucifer that the creature he had believed fettered to his whims was no mortal of Edom’s line, no supernatural beast blended of men and Darkness, bound for Purgatory, no godling from pantheons whose power had dimmed with the loss of their supplicants.

He was an archangel, Lucifer’s equal. His sword slid into his hand, his bearing announcing louder than any words that he would not yield easily. Not this time.

Lucifer’s eyes met his calmly, even as a smile twitched at that beautiful mouth, hinting at the dimples Sam Winchester had once displayed with such winsome innocence. Wings the color of bloodstone swept out, and his own blade flickered into his massive grip.

There were no words as Lucifer advanced on him, Gabriel meeting him halfway. He could feel, just as Lucifer could, that the Cage was opening. Michael was being released, was taking possession of his perfect Vessel. This was a delay, a diversion, nothing more. Gabriel had known from the start that his life was forfeit, no matter the outcome of this final gambit. But he could give Michael and Dean time to join. To prepare for their last chance to save this world.

Lucifer’s blade swung. Gabriel dodged, his sword scalloping easily to block it as he danced away. Lucifer spun out, unlocking his weapon from Gabriel’s, sword-arm snaking out as he came around in a wide swing that might have beheaded the smaller archangel if Gabriel hadn’t parried across fast enough.

And in that instant, Lucifer finished whirling. Nose to nose with his brother, his free hand buried one of his daggers in Gabriel’s stomach. The blade scythed through his vessel’s entrails, tearing his grace open, leaving Gabriel sagging against Lucifer’s weight as his body tried to absorb a death-blow.

Lucifer let his sword flicker out, catching Gabriel’s sword arm by the elbow. He fell against Lucifer, choking on blood and the grace that was suddenly flooding his mortal form. The warm, horrifically safe arms of his brother went around him, pulling him into a final mockery of an embrace.

“You betrayed me, Gabriel,” that silken, husky voice murmured in his ear. “How… disappointing.”

He wanted to say something, anything, to take his brother down a peg. One last witticism after an impossibly long lifetime of practice. He couldn’t. His throat was too clogged with pain and blood and the fire of his inner being, his fingers wrapping into the soft fabric of Lucifer’s suit jacket as if he could be anchored in this plane by it for just a few moments longer.

“The last thing you will hear,” Lucifer purred, not even a trace of compassion in his voice, “is your last hope dying.” And then he released Gabriel, letting his brother tumble to the dusty path as he turned his attention to Castiel’s cabin.

Dean was standing at the top of the steps, his eyes calm as he regarded the monster his brother had become. He saw the Trickster in a dying heap on the ground as Lucifer took a careful step around the body, saw Castiel lying sprawled nearby. He was alone now: truly and utterly alone, facing down the creature that had somehow convinced Sam to give up the rights to his own flesh.

Except he wasn’t. Michael was there, behind his eyes, under his skin. He wasn’t the only one trying to stop Lucifer from taking out his issues with God on the human race.

“Hello, Michael.” Lucifer’s voice was calm, even a little unsurprised. Dean’s hearing was enhanced by Michael’s presence, though, and he caught the tiny edge of hesitance that mirrored Gabriel’s earlier. That brief note that spoke louder than anything else to the one truth humans seemed to constantly ignore: their savior and their destroyer were brothers. Were as loath to confront one another as any human would be their own siblings.

“Michael’s a little busy right now,” Dean replied, coming down the stairs at an almost jogging pace and stopping a few steps away from the cabin. “He’s been tied up for a couple years now; there’s a few things he’s gotta do before he can come kick your ass up and down the eastern seaboard.”

The slightest widening of those bright hazel eyes was all that betrayed what had to be utter shock. “Dean… of all the mountains of stupid, this has to be Everest. What could you possibly hope to accomplish?”

“Got some unfinished business to handle myself,” Dean replied, taking another step towards the brightest star to ever fall from the sky. “Haven’t talked to Sam in years now, after all. You mind?”

Lucifer’s mouth actually parted on a chuckle. “You really are insane,” he muttered. “Even if I were inclined to let you and Sammy have a little fraternal heart-to-heart before I rip yours out, what makes you think he even _wants_ to talk to you?”

That gave Dean half a moment’s pause. The tiny falter in his step was like a flare going up, and Lucifer seized on it. “You can’t possibly believe that Sam would care what you have to say, after what you did, Dean. You found out that I wanted him for my Vessel, and that he wanted to hunt me down the same way he did Lilith, and what did you do? You cut him loose. You finally gave up on him right when he needed you the most.”

“That ain’t what I did and you know it,” Dean shot back. “Whatever you did to force him to say yes-”

“Force him?” Lucifer’s smile widened, incredulity and amusement mixing in his expression before melting into a strange kind of sympathy. “Dean… really. You think I had to force Sam to accept me? When he and I were made for each other, literally? He wanted to say yes from the moment I rose. It was only loyalty to you that gave him any reason to resist.”

That propelled Dean an angry step closer, his own eyes flashing dangerously. “Bullshit. Sam would never have said yes if you hadn’t made him.”

Lucifer took another step, closing the distance between them. “You abandoned him, Dean. You thought it would make you stronger if you didn’t have to carry him all the time; if your precious baby brother wasn’t there weighing you down. You gave up on him. When he finally sought me out, it didn’t take him long to realize that it wasn’t vengeance he wanted. He’d spent all that time looking for the only being left in Creation that cared about him at all.”

“You don’t give two shits about Sam,” Dean spat. “Or any human. All you care about is wrecking your Daddy’s toys since he wouldn’t let you have your own way.”

“Call it what you like, Dean,” Lucifer faux-conceded. “But everything I’ve done for the last several _centuries_ has been in preparation for Sam. And when this is over, I’ll give him anything his heart desires. Everything he could ever want will be laid out at his feet. Only through him can I cleanse God’s perfection of the stain of humanity. Out of all of you, Sam is the only one I can truly esteem, for only he is fit to carry me. He has been my only care, Dean, even above my vengeance. In your heart of hearts, can you really say the same?”

Dean reached up, his fingers brushing past the tiny scar on Sam’s cheek. So tiny it was practically a birthmark, where Sam had been burned while Dean had carried him from the fire so long ago. Just a faint mark a little whiter than the rest of his skin, matched by a smear on the pads of Dean’s right fingers where he’d burned himself getting the red-hot splinter off his baby brother’s face. “You have no idea, you petulant asshole.”

A massive hand snapped up, catching Dean’s wrist. Dean looked into the eyes he’d known his entire life, as unafraid to challenge the Devil as he’d been with every other creature he’d ever hunted. He saw, therefore, the moment when something behind those eyes shifted, a flash of recognition. “Sammy?”

He didn’t see the blow coming, so focused was he on chasing that flicker of his brother’s soul in those hazel eyes. The impact of it shattered his jaw and snapped his spine within his neck, and Dean’s body would have crashed to the ground if not for the skin and muscle of the arm trapped in his brother’s grip, though the force dislocated his shoulder.

It was the strangest sensation he’d ever experienced: he could feel his bones knit back together as the grip on him shifted, the sudden numbness of paralysis evaporating as life infused his limbs. And then he was being hauled up for another blow, and his hands were snaking up to scrabble at Sam’s shoulders. “Sammy, I’m here… Sammy!”

“You let go!” It was a roar, echoing in Dean’s ears between the ring of punctured eardrums sealing back together. Dean was fighting for footing, fighting to get too close for a good blow to be swung, fighting to get through to Sam. “You promised and then you let go!”

“I’ve got you, Sam.” Dean threw his weight against Sam’s, a wrestling match that had gone on since their childhood now reinforced with angelic strength, forcing himself into Sam’s space. “I’ve got you.”

“You promised me!” There was just the faintest change, a note of duality in the voice, and then the struggle was twice as fierce, finding the weak spots in Dean’s grip and breaking it. Another blow swung hard under Dean’s jaw, and Dean felt himself break and mend in the same instant as he forced himself to understand the words that were screamed at him in the moonlight. “You promised! You promised and then you _just let go of me!_ ”

Dean retreated, blocked the arm that swung and locked it against his body. “Sammy…”

“No!” A fierce kick struck Dean’s stomach like a blow from a horse. Dean staggered back, losing his grip on Sam, and then Sam was on him again, but it wasn’t entirely Sam this time, either. Two younger brothers, fighting for control, both needing to express the same rage.

Dean doubted that the world could survive the full expression of their combined fury.

* * *

The fight sounded further away than it really was. Gabriel knew how close it had to be, but his vessel’s senses were fading as both grace and blood drained from the wound in his gut, staunched only by the blade still embedded in his entrails.

Pain lanced through him as he tried to move, to shift just a little. Even in dying, there had to be something more he could do, some way to help Dean and Michael get through to their younger brothers…

A faint presence touched the edges of his awareness, gentle and soothing. A touch like his Father’s, absent so long that Gabriel moaned for want of more. Dimming amber eyes opened in a primal need to find its source, searching the sky and scrub around him.

Just beyond the brush line, hovering with anxious eyes, was one of the members of Dean’s camp. How he’d escaped Lucifer’s initial onslaught, Gabriel couldn’t fathom, but there was nothing the nervous little human could do, for Gabriel or the brothers waging war on one another nearby…

And then, Gabriel felt it.

It penetrated the haze of pain and death creeping over his mind: a wash of light and understanding that bathed away the shadows, suffusing Gabriel with more love than he’d felt from any creature above Hell in millennia.

A smile tugged at blood-flecked lips. The nervous little human returned it, having caught Gabriel’s eyes. The exchange between them was silent, unimportant, ignored by the archangels and the humans that carried them only a few steps away. But it heralded something Gabriel had never anticipated. Something that might just salvage this mess once and for all.

His shaking, numb fingers were barely able to perform the snap he required of them. Marshalling the last ounces of his strength, Gabriel wrapped his fingers around his trumpet and brought it to his lips.

With a final gulp of air, Gabriel closed his eyes and sounded his Horn.

* * *

The blast of a trumpet, unexpected and strangely triumphant, startled all four combatants. Sam and Dean Winchester, with mortal understanding, had no idea how to process what was happening or why. There was no real need for them to, as it was a sound neither had ever really been meant to hear.

Michael and Lucifer forced their vessels’ awareness aside on the second note, their eyes first drawn to their dying younger brother, and then to the tree line just beyond. A glow unfurled, light coiling out like a rose blooming, warm and soft and yet impossibly intense. It swelled until even angelic eyes had to be shielded from its brightness, and then faded back, curling back in upon itself even as its warmth lingered in the air.

As both angels’ eyes adjusted back from the flare, a young man stepped through the shrubbery, his eyes bright and kind. His barely shaven face was stained with dirt and dried blood, though he sported no injuries of his own, and though his expression was calm, even a little stern, there was a hint of a smile buried in the corners of his lips.

Michael was slower to understand than Lucifer, unable to comprehend what a mortal prophet would be doing here. Lucifer saw through the guise immediately. “Yeshua.”

“Hello, Lucifer.” He paused beside Gabriel, whose hand was no longer able to support the Horn, his eyes dimming and his lips going slack. “Rest now, Gabriel,” he instructed, crouching down and brushing gentle fingers over Gabriel’s cold hand. “Go Home and rest.”

A flash of light, and Gabriel’s last ounce of grace died away, his beautiful opal wings dissolving into ash beneath his prone form.

The Son stood, turning to look at the angels. “Hasn’t this gone on long enough? Done enough damage?”

“You know as well as anyone else what started this,” Michael advised solemnly. “And what our Father’s instructions were.”

One dark brow quirked, and the face of Chuck Shurley twisted in skepticism. “Yeah, I do. But since Dad never bothered to consult _me_ on the subject, and He also happens to be abstaining from the issue, I’ve decided that we’re gonna suspend the rules just a bit.”

“You can’t,” Michael started.

“And you took an oath, Michael,” Lucifer interrupted. “You have to obey Him; He was born human. You swore that ridiculous oath to honor humans above Him, and that means even if their orders countermand Father’s instructions.”

“But you swore that you would never honor humans above the Trinity,” Yeshua reminded Lucifer, cutting in just as fast. “The Father and the Holy Spirit are but two parts of that. I am the Third, Brother. Human or not, you must obey as well.”

Comprehension dawned on Lucifer’s face. Michael laughed. “I think that just came back to bite you in the ass, brother.”

“Oh, shut up, Michael,” Lucifer snapped. “In case you don’t recall, my disobedience of Father’s orders is the entire reason you decided I wasn’t worth protecting anymore.”

“I tried to protect you!” Michael spun on his heels, glaring at Lucifer with Dean’s snapping jade eyes. “I tried to bring you back, to make you see reason so I could protect you from punishment. You refused! You’re the one whose stubbornness and malice had brought this-”

“Enough!” Chuck’s voice thundered over the beginnings of another spat, and his dark eyes flashed up at his brothers. “Lucifer… Heylel. Who are you really angry with? Edom’s descendants, or Michael and Father? Because I think you and I both know Edom never asked for anything from you. Taking it out on his and Yeva’s children might feel good for a while, but it doesn’t solve the problem and you know it.” Lucifer’s face darkened, but he did not speak, acknowledging silently that the Son had made his point.

“And Michael. After everything you’ve seen, everything that you know, can you really say that the flaws Lucifer pointed out about humans were wrong? That he didn’t have very legitimate reasons for saying he couldn’t bring himself to love an imperfect creature over one he perceived as perfect?”

“That doesn’t make what he did acceptable,” Michael countered weakly. “And seeing his point of view doesn’t ameliorate the current situation.”

“No. That’s my job.” Christ crossed his arms, looking at both of them with an irritated expression. “We’re going home. _All_ of us. And you two are going to stay in one place and hash out your differences. And then we’re going to talk about the rest of this mess like family is supposed to.”

Before either angel could object, there was a surge of divine will.

Bathed in white light brighter even than the full moon, Dean saw the angelic cast to his brother’s features fall away. Only Sam was left behind: innocent, tortured eyes that locked onto his own with a hungry expression that brought tears to Dean’s eyes. “Sammy?” He reached out, taking hold of Sam’s upper arm. “Sam?”

“Dean?” The word was hurt, confused, relieved; a cascade of emotions pouring into one syllable. Sam was searching Dean’s face, looking for something…

And then those hazel eyes rolled back, his entire body locking as Sam Winchester’s archangel-abused mind went into grand mal seizure.

Reflexes of a lifetime had Dean grabbing Sam’s body, easing it to the ground as Sam arched and seized in his hands. “Sam? Sam!” No matter how he shouted, Sam didn’t respond; saliva bubbled at the corner of his mouth as his body continued to writhe, and Dean hadn’t felt this helpless since the last time Sam had died in his arms. “I’m not letting go, Sammy. You hear me? I ain’t letting go!”

The light around them intensified. Dean barely noticed, worried as he was for Sam. Images began to flash in his mind: memories of a childhood spent in the back seat of the car now rusting outside the fence; of fevers soothed and injuries mended by Sam’s gentle hands. Of relief at knowing Sam was once again alive and whole, that his soul was worth the one thing he’d ever really valued it for. Of lovers and friends now long dead, of the gypsy life that had always suited him so well. Of the thrill of a good hustle, of getting enough money to swing good seats at a concert or game. Of satisfaction at putting something nasty down, or being able to give a restless spirit its final peace.

Of Castiel, and everything the angel had meant to him. Of a night when grief had become more than he could bear, and he’d taken the only kind of solace he’d ever known from an angel that deserved far more from Dean than he’d ever gotten. He’d taken something precious that night, and the confusion in those blue eyes had permanently affirmed everything he’d always believed about himself.

The last thing Dean Winchester saw was the little brother he’d failed, once again dying in his arms. “I’m here, Sammy… I’m never letting go again. I’m right here…”


	5. Ora e Sempre – Part Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.” – Orson Welles_

~ooooOOOoooo~

 

Dean Winchester hadn’t spent very many nights in his life feeling warm and comfortable in bed. And while almost any luxury he might have wanted could’ve been salvaged from a nearby city in recent years, he’d preferred to eschew the creature comforts he’d once prized. He didn’t deserve them, not after everything he’d done.

So waking up in a soft, warm bed in a room that smelled faintly of apple pie spice was definitely an unfamiliar experience.

His eyes snapped open and Dean sat up, throwing off the blankets as his hand automatically dove under the pillow for a knife that wasn’t there. Its absence threw him, and Dean took an extra second to cautiously gauge his surroundings.

The room was gently lit, with sunlight streaming through moderately-sized windows, framed by the straight-hemmed, unruffled panels of long taupe curtains. There were trees in full leaf beyond the window, and though it was closed, Dean was sure the air outside would be fragrant with the scent of sun-warmed leaves. The walls were painted a jewel-tone blue-green not quite the same shade as his eyes: a calming color that seemed to work its magic on his racing heart before he could think better of relaxing. The throw-rug of deep velvety brown was soft under his bare feet, and the hardwood floors beyond its edges gleamed warmly in the sunlight.

He couldn’t remember how he’d come to be here: the room was neat as a pin, the furniture a golden oak, the door to the hallway open as if there were nothing to fear beyond it. It was somewhat akin to what Dean remembered of his childhood home before the fire that had claimed his mother’s life, or the way Lisa’s house had felt when he’d last seen her and Ben unaffected by the ravages of the apocalypse, but it wasn’t a recreation or a blending of those places. Rather, it was reminiscent because it felt the same: like a place where a family lived without fear of the things in the dark.

And then it hit him, his eyes widening as he remembered: not how he came to be here, but what had been happening just before he’d awoken. Except that he knew, in his bones, that he hadn’t dreamt any of it. None of the horror and death and disaster of his memories had been a nightmare.

“Dean?” Sam’s voice, calling from somewhere in the hall. Not quite panicked, but definitely worried, as uncertain of what was happening as Dean himself was. “Dean, are you here?”

Vaulting up from the bed, Dean barely noticed that he was only wearing a tee shirt and boxers as he dashed through the open bedroom door. The hallway, he registered briefly, was a not-quite-cobalt blue with neat oak trim, and there were only a few doors leading off of it. His gaze fixed on Sam, and then he saw nothing else.

Sam, hair floppy and sleep-tousled, was standing in the hall in his favorite tee shirt and athletic pants. His face registered almost heartbroken relief as he caught sight of his brother, and then Dean was moving, not caring whether Sam was closing the gap between them as well. Dean only cared about reaching his brother as fast as his bare feet would carry him.

They collided in a hug, Sam’s gigantic arms wrapping around Dean as Dean clutched him right back, a choked sob erupting from Sam’s lips and brushing over Dean’s ear like an endearment. Even if Dean had wanted to, he couldn’t have brought himself to mock Sam for it. Not when tears were burning in his own closed eyes, a few slipping past his lashes and tracking down his face to be absorbed by the soft cotton of his brother’s shirt.

“I’m sorry,” Dean murmured, clinging to Sam as hard as he could, refusing to let go. Not until he was forgiven. “I’m so sorry, Sam.”

“I’m sorry, too.” Sam tried not to actually break down and weep on his brother’s shoulder, his heart cracking in his chest at his brother’s forgiveness. If Dean was asking for it, it meant that he was offering it in return. “I’m sorry, Dean… please don’t let me go again.”

“Never,” Dean promised.

* * *

It took a long time for the brothers to release one another long enough to really explore their surroundings. The house was a modestly-sized two bedroom, with a converted attic space upstairs and a large basement. The kitchen was well-stocked, with everything that could possibly be needed to make anything for which the brothers might hunger, and the media center in the family room was possibly the most indulgent either had ever seen.

A two-tiered deck, accessed through a sliding glass door and complete with wrought-iron patio furniture and a Jacuzzi, extended off the family room and out into a spacious yard. Paths of crushed stone wound around the property, and the gardens were verdant, filled not with flowers but with fruit-bearing shrubs and fragrant herbs. There was a fire-pit not far from the lower deck, and there was a garage large enough to be another house.

Dean found it only fitting that his baby, somehow miraculously restored to her pre-apocalyptic glory, had her own living quarters complete with every tool and unguent that might ever be needed to keep her in pristine order.

Even more amazing to Sam: Bones was there. The faithful golden retriever that had been his companion during his two week rebellion in Flagstaff was no longer nearly emaciated, his body lean and his coat gleaming in the sunlight as he’d barreled across the yard and leaped up at Sam to lick his face in enthusiastic greeting.

“You always wanted a dog, Sammy,” Dean observed with a soft chuckle, stepping forward to extend his hand for the customary human-to-canine greeting gesture.

Bones dropped and gave a low warning growl at Dean at first, having no idea who Dean was beyond the man that had taken his friend away all those years ago and forced him back into a life of loneliness until he’d eventually been struck by a car.

“Stop it, Bonesy,” Sam chastised. “Dean’s not going to make me leave you again. He can’t.” He hunkered down to the dog’s level, wrapping his long arms around Bones’ chest and scratching his ears. “Bones was my dog in Flagstaff… remember?”

“Oh, yeah.” Dean remembered well: remembered wishing they could have brought the dog with them. But it was impractical given the lives they led, and their father was already going to be furious enough. He’d made Sam leave the dog behind, his little brother not seeing that his own eyes were moist with sympathy as Sam had bid his companion a tearful good-bye. “Guess it’ll take him a while to get used to me.”

“Probably.” Sam held his dog while Dean extended his hand again, murmuring encouragingly in Bones’ ear. When Bones sniffed the appendage, then, smelling Sam on it, gave it a gentle lap with his tongue, Sam smiled. “Then again, he was always pretty smart.”

* * *

It took time for the hunters to restrain their impulses to further explore, to test out any of the dozen luxuries they had seldom, if ever, been afforded in their lives. There were questions to be answered first, before accepting that they’d somehow been transported into a home that seemed perfectly suited to whatever they might desire.

“But where are we?” Sam asked, for what was possibly the thousandth time combined between them. “I remember… things got pretty well annihilated after a while. No place should look like this. Not anymore.”

“And the Impala,” Dean reminded him. “She got too recognizable, and then there wasn’t anything to keep her up with. Broke my heart, but I had to leave her to rust. But there’s not a mark on her now; she looks like she did before that truck ran us down and I had to rebuild her.”

“I don’t get it, Dean.” Sam’s worried face came out in full force. “The last thing I remember, really remember, was saying yes. And then seeing you there when he left me. There are… things in the middle: snippets of stuff that I think he wanted me to see or remember; but… I know we destroyed everything we could.”

“ _You_ didn’t do a damn thing, Sam,” Dean countered sharply. “That… _thing_ that you let up in your skin did. But that’s not important right now. We gotta figure out-”

“How you got here?”

Both brothers jumped up, turning as one to face the person that had spoken. Chuck Shurley was standing on the deck, his face somewhat sheepish as he slid the screen door open and crossed the threshold. “Chuck?”

“Hey, guys. Sorry I startled you.” Chuck closed the door behind himself, stepping over to where the Winchesters stood, now more confused than defensive. Bones approached him immediately, giving a happy little whine and his tail wagging; Chuck reached down to give the dog’s ears a thorough rub as he murmured a greeting, and then gestured for the brothers to sit. “I hope I got everything right; it took a bit longer than I thought it would to combine both of your memories and wants into someplace cohesive.”

Sam’s brow furrowed. Dean quirked an eyebrow at the nervous little prophet. “What do you mean: you hope _you_ got everything right?”

Chuck’s smile got a little more sheepish. “You remember how I said when we met that I was a god? I was being a little facetious at the time… but it’s more or less accurate.”

“You’re God?” Dean repeated incredulously.

“The Son,” Chuck clarified. “The Living Word, which is an aspect of the triune entity you refer to as God.” He cleared his throat, shifting in his seat a little. “I’ve been bouncing around Earth for a while now, ever since the apocalypse became a very real possibility. But my true nature had to be hidden, even from the angels. That’s why Castiel and the others didn’t realize I was any more than a prophet when they encountered me. Only Gabriel would have known me for who I really am, because of his role in triggering my second divine manifestation.”

It took a moment for the memory to clear in Sam’s mind. “The trumpet blast. That was Gabriel’s Horn, announcing you.”

“Essentially.” Chuck let out a soft laugh. “A little flamboyant for my tastes, actually, but there are certain rules that have to be observed when it comes to this sort of thing.”

“So… where are we?” Sam asked, still trying to puzzle through the new information.

“Heaven,” Chuck answered. “Specifically: yours and Dean’s together. You were always meant to share one, and when I brought you both here, I directed its construction a bit more than is usually done. After everything that’s happened, I wanted to make sure nothing got left out in the merging.”

Sam and Dean looked at each other in consternation. “So… we’re dead?”

Chuck tipped his head from side to side, his face scrunching up for a moment. “Not precisely. You, and a certain number of others, were assumed into Heaven body and soul. If you absolutely had to be returned to Earth for any reason, your physical bodies would be available to you just as they were before I brought you here; you’re sort of in them now, sort of… except not. There isn’t really a precise way to explain it in mortal languages.”

“Why?” Sam demanded. “Why me, especially?”

“Because you deserve it.” Chuck gave both brothers a fond little smile. “And no, it’s not just because I like you boys. You’ve both been through so much, been yanked around so hard for your entire lives, that I overrode any claim Hell might have on either of you and absolved you of your sins after I put you in the… we’ll call it a hibernation state… that was necessary to bring you, whole, onto this plane.

“And before either of you say anything,” he continued sternly, “it’s my decision and there’s no revoking it. It’s done, whether you think you deserve it or not. So no trying to give it back or convince someone that I was wrong. You’re here and you’re staying.”

“What about Earth?” Dean asked, his eyes bright with concern. “And all the people that were left down there in that mess? What happens to them now?”

“That’s my concern.” After a moment’s consideration and in the face of two Winchester bitchfaces, Chuck sighed. “Guys, I know how you are. You want to fix what you think you broke. You want to earn the redemption you’ve been given. What you don’t understand is that you were only the tools of the breaking. Even with free will, you weren’t the ones that actually broke anything. And forgiveness is an act of compassion; it can’t be earned. It’s either given or it isn’t. I’ve given it to you, and I only expect one thing from both of you in return.”

“What’s that?” Dean asked suspiciously.

The smile on Chuck’s face, endlessly kind and touched with a soft glow from within, was all it really took to convince the brothers that he wasn’t kidding about his identity. “Be happy here. Learn how to be brothers again, without everything else getting in the way.”

Before either Winchester could try to respond to that, Chuck then stood up. “Couple things you boys should know: one, the Impala’s the real thing. Took a little finagling to get her here, but I figured she deserves her reward just as much as you both do. And Dean, I know what you’re going to say, but I needed to make a couple modifications to her to make that work.” He ignored Dean’s cry of protest. “She can travel between Heavens, which means that you can use her to go visit anyone you want to see. Just think of that person and drive; you’ll find them.

“Two, and don’t forget this one: when you boys think you’re ready, hop in the car and drive until you reach the Garden. You’ll know it when you see it. There are a couple people there waiting to talk with you, once you’ve sorted things out between yourselves and seen a few people that I know are on your minds.”

Sam took a short breath, then caught himself and looked at Chuck curiously. “Do… do we need to breathe here?”

Chuck laughed. “Not really, but you’re going to do it more out of habit than anything else anyway, and no one’s going to comment on it. Half the souls in Heaven still think they need to breathe, and the others wouldn’t think it amiss to see someone doing it.” He stood up. “I’ve got a lot going on, as I’m sure you can guess. But I’ll be around to visit, and you can just call out to me if you need something.”

“Thanks, man.” It was Dean’s turn to be tripped up by habit now. “So… what are we supposed to call you, anyway? ‘Cause I think ‘Living Word’ is just gonna be awkward.”

Another soft laugh. “Just call me Chuck. It’s what you’re used to, and I’ll hear your call regardless of what name you use.” Another fond smile, and then he was gone.

Dean looked at Sam. Sam looked at Dean. For a moment, there was really nothing to say. They were in Heaven, together. All of their burdens lifted, all of their duties discharged. They could just be brothers, have a normal life together… or as normal as Paradise could get.

“I’m thinking beer, pie and a Bruce Lee marathon,” Dean finally suggested.

“Sounds good to me,” Sam agreed with a grin.

* * *

Time did and didn’t seem to pass. The sun-dappled afternoons shifted into warm evenings full of fireflies and crickets, and then deep starry nights that blurred into warm lavender dawns and blue dew-drenched mornings. Seasons changed, because it was what the boys wanted, but the autumn crispness blended into a winter of fluffy snow that did exactly what every human wished: stayed off the paths and driveways and roads while piling into deep, perfect drifts elsewhere. Spring was full of riotous colors and birdsong, and then summer circled back again, the lazy heat of its days never becoming unbearable.

It took Dean and Sam the better part of that first year to really work through everything that had ever gone wrong between them, in large part because they were both masters of avoiding conversations even if there was nothing urgent to distract them. Traveling to see family and friends helped some, and so did Bones: peace and safety and unconditional love all working inexorably to drawn out the poison hidden beneath their psyches’ scars; and the bond between them flourished as they found themselves with the time and the luxury to settle all the old disputes and heal all the old wounds.

They visited Lisa and Ben, whose Heaven was a perfect little suburbia. It was a little disconcerting for Dean to realize that Lisa’s Heaven included a vaguely-similar recreation of him, though after giving it some thought, he was glad of it. There was no way he could abandon Sam, and Lisa’s Heaven didn’t include his brother as anything other than a family member that lived somewhere-not-with-them. And the Dean she wanted, the Dean that could live in that world, wasn’t who Dean had ever really been. She and Ben were happy in this place of might-have-beens, and Dean decided it was best to leave them be, grateful to know that both the woman he might have grown to love and the child of his heart were at peace.

It had upset Sam to discover that Madison was in Purgatory because she’d been a werewolf when she’d died, and Chuck had bent over backwards to reassure him that Purgatory wasn’t a place of punishment or endless, torturous limbo. It had its own hierarchy of punishment and reward, ruled over by the Mother of All, and it hadn’t been long before assurances had come that Madison was in a place of eternal comfort, not torment.

Sam had been unable to stay long enough to find out if Jess’ Heaven included an illusory version of him, like Dean had with Lisa and Ben. His dreams of happily-ever-after with her had been too close to realization for him to be able to handle that. But he saw her surrounded by family, her face glowing with happiness, and it was enough.

Ash, aware of his state like the brothers were, was ever the genius that he’d been in life, and had found his own ways to travel between Heavens. Pamela, also conscious of her surroundings, had taken full advantage of it, having taken something of a shine to the unusual barfly when they’d met. The two of them traversed the length of the Heavens at their will, seeking whatever adventures they could find.

Ellen and Jo were in separate Heavens, but they were able to cross each other’s boundaries because they were both a part of Bill Harvelle’s, who’d been waiting patiently for many years for his wife and daughter to join him. The reunion between Dean and Jo had been a little awkward at first, but Bill had smoothed things over by clearing up the lingering ghosts surrounding his death, and John Winchester's role in it. Ellen herself looked younger and happier than either brother had ever seen her, now that she had rejoined the love of her life.

Singer Salvage Yard looked exactly as it had before the demonic assault that had driven Bobby from his home. It surprised Dean and Sam a little to realize that Bobby’s Heaven was no different than his waking life had been, but the addition of Bobby’s wife Karen was apparently the only thing that had been missing from his Earthly existence. This time the awkwardness was between Bobby and Sam, but it lasted only long enough for Bobby to call Sam a ‘damned idjit’, and then everything was all right again.

Dean resolved that they would visit the Singers as often as the couple could stand their presence. After all, Karen Singer turned out to be quite possibly the very best pie-maker on any plane of existence, and Dean rather loftily informed Sam that Heaven couldn’t be complete without copious amounts of her handiwork. Bobby had fondly called him a ‘double-damned idjit’ and sent them back to their Heaven with several boxes of his wife’s pastry creations. After all, food didn’t spoil in Heaven; they’d keep until Dean could demolish them.

Finding their parents had been the most difficult decision either brother had made. Neither was sure of the reception they would receive, if their parents were even aware of all that had passed since their deaths.

It wasn’t really surprising to either brother, though, to find that Mary and John’s Heaven was one of memory and might-have-been commingled, or that neither seemed to be aware of their state. They were happy here: Mary had the normal life for which she’d always longed, and John had Mary, the pole by which he’d fixed the compass of his heart. Sam and Dean watched themselves as children perpetual, playing in a home untainted by darkness. It was an idyll neither brother had the heart to disturb.

But John had seen them watching, had given both boys the faintest of nods. There was time to explore that later. An eternity lay before them: more than enough time to test the limits of a soul’s decision to remain safely ensconced in blissful fantasy.

There were others they wanted to see, of course: Adam and Rufus, Andy and Missouri. They wanted to find the Heavens of entertainers and philosophers, to explore the Fields of the Lord beyond the borders of their own perfect haven, to sate curiosity and maybe, just maybe, find a way beyond the limits of human paradise and find the places that angels called home.

But there was one last trip to make before they could begin the rest of their eternity in earnest, and the brothers had run out of reasons to delay it any longer.


	6. Ora e Sempre – Part Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.” – Orson Welles_

~ooooOOOoooo~

 

Morning came, bright and blue and beautiful. Dean glanced at the sky from where he lay, still curled under the soft quilt, sighing pensively with one hand tucked under his head. “Is it weird that I wish the weather’d be just a little not perfect around here?”

Sam chuckled from his place on the bed next to his brother, pushing up so his weight rested on his forearms. “Man, the weather does whatever we want, remember? You hate driving in the rain, so it’s always clear and sunny when we’re heading out someplace.”

Dean’s only response was to pull the pillow out from under his head and wail his brother with it before getting up and grabbing the first steam shower.

From the very first night, they’d been unable to sleep apart. Too much had happened, had left them too vulnerable to be comfortable alone. Even on days when they’d torn into one another, poison from wounds unhealed spewing out at each other in vicious arguments, when the night drew down and the house was far too quiet, one would eventually slip into the other’s bedroom with a regretful expression and an apology slipping in a whisper from their lips.

After about five months, they’d finally reached the mutual decision that it was better to just never go to bed angry and Dean moved Sam into his bedroom. Dean fell asleep far more easily with Sam’s huge, warm hand resting somewhere on his body, and Sam woke from Lucifer-centric nightmares to Dean’s gentle fingers brushing the hair from his eyes, low voice crooning ‘Hey, Jude’ in the darkness.

Things were better between them now, with what felt like a year of mortal time under their belts and the major issues between them worked through. Habits of a lifetime dying hard, the boys prepared for this morning’s trip like any other: cooler and overnight bags tucked safely into the back seat beside Bones, who obediently curled up in his bed at Sam’s command, Dean starting the trip behind the wheel with a smile in his eyes. The fraternal bickering over music had resumed almost immediately, and Sam took an almost fiendish delight in the way all of Dean’s cassettes became “Best of Queen” tapes when he commandeered the music selection for more than a fortnight.

Driver might still pick the music, and shotgun might still have to shut his cakehole, but the Impala apparently got a say in the matter now, too, and that trumped everybody.

The Garden was farther away than any trip the former hunters had taken since their assumption into Heaven, though like all of their other journeys, they perceived it merely as a long, scenic jaunt down a ribbon of endless highway. Forests and mountains and fields and lakes slid by them, and the boys slipped from singing loud and silly and off-key into quiet contemplation of the beauty around them.

When the Garden finally came into sight, Dean drove more than a few circles around it before he gave up on spotting anything resembling a gate. The Impala purred to a halt, and both brothers slowly stepped out to gaze at the massive barrier before them.

In something akin to a biosphere, it vaulted up in an impossible shimmering prism, like a soap bubble that would never burst. Lush vegetation, dense and green and inviting, seemed to grow right up to the swirling rainbow wall, with no paths or tracks that might have even hinted at a way inside.

“Stay, Bones,” Sam cautioned, not wanting the dog to get out until they knew what was happening. He looked at Dean. “Maybe we’re early?”

“You’re kidding, right?” Dean looked up at the walls, then gave a ‘what-the-Hell’ shrug. “Anybody home?”

A few feet to their right, light erupted from the wall, glowing outward like the portals that had opened when Michael and Lucifer had been released from the Cage. Bones whined and jumped out, coming to stand protectively between the brothers. Squinting for a moment, Dean’s felt his jaw drop when he saw the being that emerged from the light, which continued to stream in shifting rays of magnesium white after the creature exiting the Garden stepped clear.

It was Castiel. Whole and hale and looking almost exactly as he had when Dean first met him on Earth after his resurrection: perpetually mussed inky black hair, softly rounded face with finely arched cheekbones, slender pink lips and brilliant blue eyes. He smiled softly when he saw the Winchesters, walking towards the dumbfounded hunters as they stared in undisguised shock, his midnight wings stretched out behind him in their full glory as they could never have been on Earth.

“Hello, Dean. Sam.” His voice was just as gravelly as they remembered, though there was a lightness about him that neither Winchester had ever really seen before. Bones gave a little bark of greeting, then sat when Castiel briefly met the dog’s soft brown eyes in acknowledgment. “I’m glad you could finally make it.”

“Cas?” Sam found his voice first, somehow not quite as affected by Castiel’s appearance as Dean was. “You’re… you’re an angel again.”

“Yes.” Castiel looked at Sam, though his eyes continued to flicker back to Dean every few seconds. “Christ felt that the removal of my grace was unjustified, just as He apparently felt my death in His defense was. He returned it, and bade me come here to wait for you both.” Another glance at Dean, and then Castiel forced himself to focus on Sam. “You should know that I bear you no ill will, Sam. Lucifer’s actions once he took possession of you were beyond your control, and resisting the call between angel and vessel is virtually impossible. I doubt Dean would have managed it for long if Raphael had not cast Michael into the Cage, and I especially doubt that the two of you banding together in a resolve to resist them would have altered that overmuch.”

A lump clogged Sam’s throat, and he reached out to clasp Castiel’s shoulder in gratitude. “Thanks, Cas… but I’m sorry, anyway.”

Castiel shook his head. “It is not important. The portal will allow you to enter the Garden; Gabriel asked that Christ allow you to enter unescorted, since he wishes to speak with you alone.”

Sam started. “What? Why?”

“I do not know. He and I have been recuperating here, caring for one another until your arrival. But Gabriel insisted that when you did come, he be allowed to speak with you alone.” Castiel gestured. “Go on. He’s waiting for you.”

Sam glanced briefly at Dean, a reflex that had almost instantly resumed now that they were living together again. Dean’s gaze flickered once to the doorway Cas had come through, and then he nodded. “Go on, Sammy. I’ll be right here when you’re done.”

Reassured, though more than a little nervous, Sam nodded and walked over to the doorway. “Stay, Bones.” Taking a swift breath, he stepped across the threshold of light.

Once he crossed through the barrier, the light faded away, leaving only the soft sunlight filtered through the prismatic barrier surrounding the Garden. For a moment, all Sam could do was stare, his mind trying to catalogue all of the green surrounding him, and realizing in a moment that, strangely, he knew the name of every plant and animal that was sheltered in this place.

He wandered along the path that wound away from him: smooth, dry earth, dotted here and there with small growing plants. It kept striking him that he could identify each and every form of life he saw: from the dart of animals he barely caught in his peripheral vision to the tiny flowering vines that wound around massive tree trunks. He’d never been much interested in herbology or botany beyond the need to identify ritual elements, and zoology hadn’t even been that important.

“It’s because Edom named them.”

Startled, Sam’s gaze dropped as he turned around to find the voice. His eyes lit on Gabriel, who was seated on a thick tree branch that curved away from the trunk of its tree at about waist level, creating a near-perfect place to sit or recline in the shady bower the upper branches created. “Gabriel.”

“Edom named everything here,” Gabriel informed him. “This was the first place created for humans, and even after all your generations, the memory of this place and the birthright you were to have here is still written in your bones.”

Sam’s chest went tight, nausea roiling up inside him as he remembered. More than anything else, he remembered the times that Lucifer had taken Gabriel to bed. The wall between he and Lucifer had been thinner in those moments, as if Lucifer was unable to keep Sam at a distance. Sam remembered all too well the blind expression in those golden eyes that Lucifer never seemed to notice; the tiny edges to passion-sounds that betrayed how little Gabriel wanted what was happening, but how much he would rather submit and live to find a way to escape than resist and die.

No matter what the Trickster had done, to Dean or him or any of his other victims, Sam would never have wished on Gabriel what Lucifer had used his body to do.

Those amber eyes were studying him now, quiet but not walled off like Sam had seen a hundred times before. And then Gabriel hopped down from the branch and closed the distance between them. Sam stayed still, not sure what Gabriel wanted to do, only knowing that he probably deserved whatever was about to happen.

Until Gabriel flapped his wide opal wings, lifting himself off the ground enough to wrap his arms around Sam’s shoulders. Sam startled, his arms automatically curling under Gabriel’s wings as those slim thighs wrapped around his waist like they belonged there, and then those soft ribbon-candy lips were slanting over his own.

Sam was pretty sure he hadn’t been in the running for anything resembling this. Not after everything. And yet Gabriel wasn’t letting go of him, was using the fact that Sam was supporting his weight to let his grip loosen, sliding gentle fingers up into Sam’s hair and tightening his legs in ways that made Sam’s entire body light up.

He was just kissing Sam, tongue teasing and dipping but retreating before the kisses could turn messy and wet. Sam almost got the impression that Gabriel was learning the taste of him, though that had to be impossible. Lucifer hadn’t refrained from any intimacy; kissing had been the least of the things he’d done to Gabriel with Sam’s mouth.

But Sam couldn’t help melting a little at the thought of Gabriel _wanting_ to reacquaint himself with the taste of his mouth, in spite of all that had passed between them while Lucifer had owned Sam’s body.

When Gabriel finally relaxed out of the kiss, Sam’s eyes fluttered open to see the archangel watching him, a glow in those eyes that he’d only seen once before: back when he’d thought Gabriel was a simple human janitor at that college in Springfield, when the little man had flirted so shamelessly and he’d found himself flirting back, inviting the attention despite his lack of experience with men. “Um… hi?”

Gabriel smiled at him. “I’ve been wanting to do that for years,” he breathed softly, his fingers sliding through Sam’s hair and flexing against his scalp in a way that made Sam want to purr.

“I seem to remember quite a few kisses exchanged in the last few years, man,” Sam reminded him, not wanting to but feeling the need to all the same.

Those glowing amber eyes rolled, matched with a long-suffering sigh. “That was my brother, not you, genius.” The exasperation melted into a rueful smile. “I wanted to know what you taste like without my brother under your skin. Wanted to know even before Lucifer sank his meat hooks into you, actually.”

Sam’s mouth dropped open for a minute, and then he was shifting uncomfortably, not from Gabriel’s weight, but from the sudden need for a place to hide. “Gabriel, I…”

“Don’t, Sam.” Gabriel slid a finger down to cover the lips he’d just kissed to fullness. “It wasn’t you. It was never you, and I knew that. You’re so used to thinking like a human; you gotta remember that it was never your face I saw.”

Sam shifted again; Gabriel slid free of Sam’s grip, using his wings to push away so he could drop to the ground and let Sam have a few feet of space. “It doesn’t matter. None of it would’ve happened if I hadn’t let him in.”

“And you’re going to need to find a way to forgive yourself for that, Sam. You were designed on a very basic level to let him in; fighting that kind of instinct when you’ve got nothing to ground you…” Gabriel shook his head. “Can’t be done. I don’t blame you. And I underestimated Lucifer badly, or else I wouldn’t have been there for him to catch. So if we’re going to pass blame around to anyone but him, then I’m as culpable as anyone else.”

“It wasn’t your fault!” Sam challenged. “We both know what he would’ve done if you’d tried to stop him… what he _did_ do because you finally ran.”

“Then you have to accept that you were just as much of a victim as I was,” Gabriel challenged back. “For all his pretty words, if you’d pushed back too long, he’d’ve gone from courtship to coercion in a second, and we both know that, too.”

For a moment, Sam struggled, Gabriel’s logic fighting with the instinct to take the guilt on himself. Finally, his shoulders slumped a little. “Why, Gabriel?”

Gabriel smiled. “Because it’s just possible that you’re as damaged as I am. Because we have more in common than you realize, and there was something there when we first met I’d like to explore without seeing my brother behind your eyes.” He stepped closer, reaching out to fold his smaller hand into Sam’s. “It’s going to take time for you; I know that. I’m not exactly a picture of mental health. But I’ve got the time and the tools to heal here, and you do, too. So when you’re ready… if you want to give this a try…” He shrugged softly. “I’m here.”

For a moment, Sam let himself swim in incredulity, in the impossibility of it all. It made no sense that Gabriel would want anything to do with him, let alone…

Let alone care about him enough to look at him with such warm, real affection in those beautiful amber eyes.

Slowly, a genuine smile curled across Sam’s lips, popping his dimples out and reaching up to light his gentle hazel eyes. “I’d like that.”

The ArchHerald of the Lord positively glowed in response.

* * *

Meanwhile, outside the Garden, Castiel turned his attention to Dean the moment Sam stepped inside. “You’re looking well,” he observed quietly.

“You, too.” Dean had to shake himself in order to force his voice to work. “So… Chuck re-angelified you, huh?”

“Yes. He resurrected Gabriel and restored my grace, counting our sacrifices worthy of such rewards.” Castiel’s head tilted curiously, and then he shook it, a gesture he’d learned as a human. “You still don’t believe that you deserve good things, do you, Dean? Compassion bestowed upon you by the ultimate judge of all men, and you refuse to accept His judgment over your own.”

“It’s a little hard to swallow, yeah.” Dean paced, starting to turn and lean against the wall, and then stopped short. “It gonna zap me or something? Go all laser perimeter defense if I touch it?”

Castiel chuckled. “No, Dean. It cannot be penetrated by humans unless they are granted special access; not since the expulsion of Edom and Yeva. But it will not harm you to touch it.”

Dean considered that, then nodded. “Good.” Putting his back against it, Dean slid down the wall until he was sitting on the ground, knees bent up with his hands resting on them. Bones, having easily adapted to having two masters after meeting Dean, trotted over and laid down beside him. After a moment, Castiel joined them, his wings folding in. “Those are… pretty awesome, actually.”

“Thank you. It feels pleasant, not having to keep them folded away as I did in James Novak’s body.”

“Where is Jimmy, anyway?” Dean asked, suddenly curious.

“Resting with his family. It is a reward he more than earned, and I promised to protect his family. When matters deteriorated beyond my control, I could only ensure that they would be here with him.” Castiel’s eyes never left Dean, scrutinizing his every twitch and flicker of expression. “Do you find it disconcerting that I still present myself in his image?”

“Nah.” Dean shrugged, trying to play it cooler than he felt and absently scratching Bones’ head. The truth was that he couldn’t imagine Castiel looking like anyone else now, even if his time in Heaven was bringing back some mnemonic glimmers of the angel’s true face. “I’ve grown accustomed to that face.”

They sat in silence for a long moment, as if merely two old friends enjoying each other’s companionship. After several minutes, Castiel turned to him again. “Your judgment that you do not deserve good things… is that why?”

Dean glanced at his angel, puzzled. “Why what, Cas?”

“Why you turned from me after that night in the mountains.”

All traces of confusion vanished. Dean remembered the night Castiel referred to all too well: a night when he’d been in too much pain to stop himself, when he’d dragged Castiel in and unleashed a passionate onslaught over the virginal angel’s senses. Castiel had yielded without resistance, had given everything Dean never bothered to ask for before taking. Had touched Dean with such loving, if hesitant caresses that it only seemed to make the pain Dean was in that much sharper.

When dawn broke, Dean had barely been able to meet the angel’s eyes. He’d refused to allow it to happen again, refused to discuss it beyond a brief: “we shouldn’t have done that”. In the months and years that followed, as he watched Castiel spiral down into drugs and sex to drown the loss of his grace, Dean couldn’t help the sick knife-twist of guilt when he realized that he’d done something even worse to his friend. Grace could be regained or re-bestowed. He had taken a piece of Castiel the angel would never get back.

When Dean didn’t answer right away, simply averted his eyes and stared steadily at the ground beneath them, Castiel pressed on. “I assumed it couldn’t have been my inexperience; you were able to reach orgasm several times. And you brought me multiple moments of pleasure as well, so it couldn’t have been dissatisfaction with your own performance.”

Dean choked on that one, turning wide eyes on his angel. “Fuck, Cas… you still don’t mince words, do ya?”

“No… but that’s not the point.” Castiel’s eyes bored into Dean’s, having caught his gaze and now refusing to release it. “Did you forsake my bed because you had no desire to repeat the experience, or because you didn’t believe that you deserved what you found there?”

Despite wanting to cry off this discussion, hating the fact that he was in the middle of a moment straight out of a Meg Ryan movie, Dean found himself actually pushing past a lump in his throat. “You know why, Cas. Do you really need me to say it?”

“Yes, Dean.” Castiel didn’t look away, blue eyes as intent and grave as they’d always been, even when the angel had been higher than a kite with a cut string. “I think I do.”

Unable to look at his angel when he said it, Dean closed his eyes and forced the words out. “I don’t deserve you, Cas. I never have.”

Slow, as if reaching into unfamiliar territory, Castiel’s slim right hand reached up and tangled with Dean’s left. The grip tugged Dean’s arm off its perch across his knee, and their hands rested entwined on the cool, dry earth between them. It pulled Dean’s eyes open, and Castiel was still looking at him. Something Dean couldn’t bring himself to name was reflected in those cobalt eyes… something that had, he was forced to admit, been there since the first moments of their acquaintance.

“I believe I’d like to prove you wrong about that, Dean,” Castiel informed him solemnly.

A smile tugged at Dean’s lips, and he left his hand wrapped in Castiel’s. “Hell, Cas… we’ve got eternity. You might just manage it.”

Castiel quirked one eyebrow at him, yet another expression he’d learned as a human. And then his free hand reached up, tangled in the hair at the back of Dean’s head, and pulled the human in for a fervent kiss.

Dean melted into it, surprised but unwilling to fight Castiel for control. The angel’s lips moved over his own in a passionate statement of intent, and Dean moaned into it, opening for him, trying to draw out more. When those lips lifted, Dean found that his free hand was fisted in Castiel’s tunic shirt, and a whimper chased the warm breath of the angel that ghosted over his own mouth, just beginning to swell from the kiss.

“You may depend upon it,” Castiel affirmed. “Sooner than you think.”

Caught in the angel’s spell, Dean figured he could get on board with that.

 

_~And they all existed happily ever after~_

 


End file.
